"Ten Years of Changing Minds": Breaking Barriers, — the title of the 10th annual juried exhibition, aims to refute the stigma of mental illness.

Forty artists with and without disabilities, statewide, will be featured in the show in the Mezzanine Gallery, Honolulu Museum of Art Center at Linekona in May 2012. The public is invited to the Artists Reception. Light refreshments served. Parking on the street and behind Linekona. Entrances on Young Street and Beretania Ave.

VSA Hawai‘i, Department of Health, Adult Mental Health Division (AMHD), in partnership with the University of Hawai‘i Center on Disability Studies have sponsored the event for a decade.

"Breaking Barriers is an important show of work by Hawai‘i artists willing to use their creative expression to send a strong competing message against the negativity and discrimination against people with mental illness," said Susan Miller, a UH-Manoa faculty member at the Center on Disability Studies and a supporter of the show.

"Misinformation creates fear about mental illness. The media often distorts impressions by sensationalizing coverage of tragic events," said Miller who works with the National Arts and Disability Center at UCLA, and the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts in D.C. to promote career opportunities in the arts for people with disabilities.

"When the media presents misinformation, people who need mental health services can become ashamed and too fearful to seek treatment and those already in treatment are often further marginalized," Miller added.

The goal of the exhibit is to present a collective and positive voice and give visibility to all individuals whose lives, directly or indirectly, have been affected by mental illness,” she said.

For more information on the exhibition, contact Kathleen O'Bryan, Creative Director, 808-469-6651 or vsahawaii@gmail.com